October 18, 2018

For well over a century, "progressives" have a proud tradition of not only exposing what is best for other people (often correctly, I might add) but also thinking they know what other people believe (often incorrectly). There's a paternalism inherent to the progressive movement that can come awfully close to racism (or at least a white-savior complex) when it comes to policies that impact non-white people.

A recent article points out how white liberals (of which I count myself) have, on issues of race, moved to the left of black Americans.

If you, like me, hang around mostly with a liberal white set, you might believe 1) the greatest problem in poor black neighborhoods is the risk of being shot by police; 2) crime is down everywhere; 3) black neighborhoods are over-policed and 4) any attempt to apply policing solutions to neighborhood problems of crime, violence, and fear is part of a right-wing plot to throw more blacks in prison. There are other crazy things I hear as well, like, for instance, proven crime-reduction strategies -- take hot spots policing and Broken Windows (minus the zero-tolerance) -- are racist because they disproportionately impacted African Americans.

I've seen this for a while now on issues of policing issues, and it frustrates me to no end. Everybody is entitled to their own opinion, but white liberals and "progressives," particularly the woke set, seem to have a certain fondness for thinking they know what other people should believe. That is a privilege you should check.

So if, like me, you read the New York Times and listen to NPR, here are some things that might surprise you:

Blacks want more police presence more than whites want more police presence. Only 10% of blacks want less police presence. Read that again, if you have to. I remember having a discussion about this fact with a nice editor at a major national magazine. At first she simply didn't believe it. It didn't fit her worldview nor the view of her (mostly white) coworkers. It didn't fit the narrative.

Over 70% of Americans feel safe walking alone at night in the area where they live. For very low-income non-whites, it's just over half. This is on par with residents of Nicaragua and Zimbabwe! Sigh. What a country.

So if a majority of lower-income blacks feel unsafe and generally want more (and also better!) policing, why do so many of my well-off white liberals friends keep telling me that "their" problem is over-policing? And yeah, some of my best friends are black. And they tell me they don't like your paternalistic BS either.

On Tuesday 11 people were shot in Baltimore. Eleven! In one day. It made the local paper. 6 more yesterday. And perhaps another 4 or 5 today (the day isn't over). Think of the trauma that comes from this violence. The impact not just on victims but on family, friends, kids, and the entire community. It's hard to imagine. When I brought this bad day to somebody, the response was responded "there are not jobs." No shit! But there were no jobs in 2014 before violence doubled. There were no jobs on Monday. There will be no jobs tomorrow. Public order and safe streets are preconditions to fixing society's greater problems. If you don't feel safe leaving your house, very little good is going to happen.

I know there are things police cannot do. But some problems -- from squeegee boys right up to murder -- can be mitigated and even solved by good policing. And we've moved away from that in some of our cities. And that has happened, in part, because people with influence and power -- the liberal elite, if you will (a term I do not like because by most definitions I'd be part of it!) -- have bought and drunk the Kool-Aid with regards to issues of policing, race, and crime.

October 5, 2018

Former Chicago Police Officer Jason Van Dyke was convicted of second-degree murder in the shooting of Laquan McDonald. This isn't surprising. I think Van Dyke was found guilty because, get this, he was.

The video is out. Finally. After long attempts to sweep it under the rug failed.
...
It's a bad shooting.... The officer who killed McDonald fits the pattern of bad cops: high activity, drug work, too many complaints. Sure, all the complaints weren't justified, but some of them were. And undoubtedly he did a lot of bad shit that people didn't file formal complaints about.

Now of course I know that in a court of law anything Van Dyke did in the past is irrelevant to his guilt or innocence is this criminal case. Whether he was a "bad" cop or not is irrelevant and inadmissible in a court of law. But I'm mentioning it because I'm not a court of law.

Intended to kill or do great bodily harm to that individual (or knew that the act would do so); or

Knows that the acts create a strong probability of causing death or great bodily harm to the individual.

Combined with this mitigating factor:

At the time of the killing, he/she believed that the killing would have been lawfully justified but the belief was unreasonable.

Van Dyke had options not limited to A) doing nothing, B) not shooting, and C) not continuing to pump rounds into McDonald after McDonald was down. As judged by this former police officer, I say Van Dyke was not reasonable.

October 4, 2018

There an interesting study by the Urban Institute on young men carrying guns in Chicago. This has already been misrepresented in the Chicago Sun-Times as "1 in 3 young people surveyed in four Chicago neighborhoods say they carry a gun." Factually true... but meaningless because they're trying to survey people who carry a gun. 100% is the goal. It's not trying to be a representative sample (even of a high violence neighborhood) or figure out how many people carry illegal guns. Rather, they tried to figure out why people carry guns (and what will make them less likely to do so).

Not surprisingly, most people who carry a gun illegally do not do so all the time. Of gun carriers (n = 97), 7% say they always carry; 16% say they often do; 32% say sometimes; 45% rarely. Most who carry say they do so "for protection," which also isn't surprising. (What is surprising is the 6 people who said they carry a gun to commit crime.) Fear is real. So is the chance of being shot. So either we work to arm everybody who is afraid, or -- better -- we deescalate the streets and work to reduce fear by reducing violence and number of people carrying illegal guns.

Of those who carry a gun, 37% say they have been the victim of a shooting or attempted shooting in past year. 85% know somebody who has. That figure is important and perhaps not well known enough. Instead of complaining when certain politicians call Chicago a disaster or a war torn -- "oh, it's not all neighborhoods," say some -- perhaps we should focus on making sure some neighborhoods aren't so lethal!

Most respondents say it’s easy to get a gun, and they could get one in a few hours from a street dealer, a friend or family member, or steal a gun. 84% of gun carriers say they’re not likely to get caught carrying. That percentage is lower (by a little) for those who don’t carry. Still, this indicates some potential for a deterrent effect.

The sample of those who have illegally carried a gun is, not surprisingly, not pro-police. 75% of those who have carried say police have stopped them “for no good reason.” This in kind of ironic, since illegal gun carriers are exactly whom we want police to stop.

And there's an odd bit of data presentation. Either they're not being great at the stats game or are trying to mislead. I think it’s the former. Two groups are compared over and over again: “those who have carried” and “entire sample.” But why include the first group in the 2nd group and then compare differences? Separate them. Also, "entire" implies it's representative of something, but it's not. It's a non-random targeted sample.

The groups are easy to separate. Or at least I did so based on their figure 9. And when I did so, for instance, 71% of the sample says police “often stop people for no good reason.” But of those who don't carry guns, that figure goes down to 60%. Even for this sample, it’s surprising to me that of those who don't carry, as many as 40% cannot agree with the statement "police stop people for no good reason."

I would like to see a sample in the same neighborhood of those who have nothing to do with carrying illegal guns or those who do. What are their opinions of police? That’s the group I would care about, in terms of police legitimacy.

Do tell us what illegal-gun carriers think of police. But criminals aren’t supposed to like the police. And as this is an intentionally non-random sample, the part of the sample that doesn’t carry (or says they don’t) is an odd group from which one should not generalize.

Their attitudes on police will be used to question police “legitimacy,” but that seems like abit of a distraction. The carriers of guns say they are carrying because of fear of victimization. More violence decreases legitimacy. Fewer stops by the Chicago Police Department haven’t increased legitimacy. And after having a “well paid job,” the top 5 leading preventative factors, according to those who carry illegal guns, are “none of their friends did,” “knew they would be arrested,” “more police on the street,” “guns cost more," and “knew they would end up doing time.”

To me those are all clues. I do want to know why gun carriers carry guns. And I also want to know what those don't carry avoid doing so. The study concludes by stressing non-police "holistic" solutions “outside the criminal justice system” (which are no doubt needed). But based on gun-carrying respondents, four of the top six solutions involve police.

Fear of getting caught can give people an out, a good excuse to not carrying a gun. Even though people don’t want to admit it, arrest, prosecution, legal stops, and legal frisks are *part* of the solution. And while others get holistic, police can focus on the police side. Police can reduce violence by reducing fear by getting people to leave their guns at home. De-policing to reduce encounters in Chicago (and elsewhere) hasn't worked. "Holistic" needs to include police.

September 14, 2018

1) The "blue was of silence" is more fiction than fact. Sure, cops in collusion won't talk, at first. But that's hardly a blue wall. I mean, given people's natural inclination not to snitch on their friends and family, cops snitch on other cops quite regularly. Probably more so than other occupations. Why? A) cops don't like bad cops, B) when push comes to shove, people CYA and say "I'm not going to risk my pension for that dirty cop I never liked anyway."

2) The dollar amount some cops are willing to screw up their lives, their reputations, and their valuable pension. It's chump change. Lazy cops retire. Bad cops retire. But dirty cops rarely retire because being able to rat out a dirty cop is a great get-out-of-jail-free card. And that card is something other crooks find very useful. I mean, just put in 20 to 25 years and they pay you for the rest of life! And you screw it all for $100 here and $200 there?

But here we go, as reported in the Times: "One detective was allowed to pay $20 for an encounter with a prostitute that would normally cost $40." A cop gave his all for $20 off a blow job.

This was a "multi-year NYPD investigation" started by a top from a cop. But a multi-year NYPD investigation means there are a lot of well crossed T's and beautifully dotted I's.

Last I heard, 7 cops and about 20 civilians were arrested.

It's also interesting when internal PD investigation brings down dirty cops. Cops are like, "Great, system finally worked! Stupid dirty cops got what they had coming." Cop-sceptics are like, "Blue Wall of Silence is proof police are irrevocable corrupt!"

Also, for police and sex-workers alike, prostitution should be regulated and legal.

Michael Wood Jr, a former Baltimore cop, confessed many of his sins a few year ago. Because of that, he became a darling of the anti-cop left who mistook his confessing for whistle blowing. Pretty much everybody who ever worked with the guy has stories about him, and not favorable ones. I never met the guy, but I think he saw me as his nemesis. Anyway, he got his when he was shut down by the #MeToo movement and also by the fact he took a bunch of money from veterans. And pocketed the cash. He's not a force for good, no matter how much he says about how horrible police are. Mostly he just looks in the mirror.

Last time this happened was 2013. And that was preceded by similar raids in 2009 and 2005. Sometimes police get disparaged for conducting wack-a-mole policing. (In fact, sometimes *I've* disparaged police for this reason.) But one of the reasons crime is so low in NYC is because police do wack those criminal moles (and have the resources to do so) when criminals pop their heads up. Illegal public drug-dealing, so linked to violence, is exactly what police need to focus on. And the residents of America's largest public housing complex can be a little less afraid.

There will be another similar raid in Queensbridge in 2023. Mark my words. But maybe that is exactly what is needed. Or maybe a little more continued presence now, rather than a few years, really could prevent the next crew from popping up.

June 14, 2018

Over on our Quality Policing podcast, Nick Selby and I hit the road and interview Nassau County Police Commissioner Patrick Ryder

Nassau County, if you don't know, is the closer of two counties on Long Island outside of New York City. It's largely a low-crime suburban community but has been in the news lately because of MS-13 and also a high number of drug overdose deaths. 1.3 million people live in Nassau County and the police department is (give or take) the nation's 15th largest.

We discuss information sharing, gangs, immigration, drugs, opioids, diversion court, the PC police, technology, relations with the Muslim community, and so much more.

June 12, 2018

“An officer was actually on this block on another call and actually heard the shots being fired, said T.J. Smith, Baltimore City Police Spokesman. “That officer gave pursuit.” How often does that happen? And what exactly happened? An edited and shortened version of the bodycam footage had been acquired by WMAR, which made me go, "damn!" I asked T.J. Smith if I could view the entire footage, and he was kind enough to post it publicly.

Here's what happened. [There's a timeline, below.] On April 19, 2018, at approximately 15:00 hours, Officer Rogers responded to a 311 call for a landlord-tenant dispute at 1704 N Regester. Probably something like, "landlord says tenant refusing access to her building. Please see Miss Whomever." The 1700 block is a small block in my old sector. Six homes are boarded up.

Many calls are for disputes that are not or should not be a police matter. It's not his job. In civil matters, there's very little the police can or should do. In Baltimore, as in many places, the sheriff's office handles law enforcement related to housing issues. [This actually takes a great burden off police, who otherwise would have to be seen as taking take sides in evictions and like.]

The landlord tries to make it Officer Roger's matter by saying she has been threatened by the tenant. There's some debate about "street talk" at if "going all gangster" is a threat. But the officer wisely won't play this game. Presumably he's got other calls to answer. It appears he's already out of sector handling this kind of nonsense.

[My take: Apparently the furnace broke. That's a housing violation that needs fixing. Now there is something about hot water, too. The tenant reports this to the city so that he would have legal reason to stop paying rent. But, and here's the catch, the tenant doesn't want the violation fixed because as long as the status quo can be maintained, he's living rent free! So the tenant decides he won't let the landlord in. The tenant also says he's moving anyway, which is news to the landlord and no doubt will coincide with the problem being fixed. The landlord says he owes her money. She isn't going to get it. Yes, this is why people don't want to be landlords. And basically as a cop you just want to make sure everything is just calm enough -- basically that they won't start fighting -- so you can get out of there. Often the show to which police officers have a "front-row seat" is something not worth the price of admission. Again, this isn't his job.]

It's all very boring and typical. And it lasts for 7 minutes. Just as the officer is looking for a way out, boy does he find one. Gunshots ring out (7min:48sec). There are 15(?) shots in five seconds. Less than two seconds after the first shot rings out (and three seconds before the last shot) Officer Rogers takes off running, toward where the bullets are coming from. Yes, that is what most cops do.

Walter Baynes, a 30-year-old black male, had just been shot and killed, and George Evans, 69-years-old, reported to be Baynes grandfather, was shot and wounded. One of them, I presume Baynes, had a gun on him when he was shot (13:23). The gunshots sound like they come from one gun, at least to my ears. But given the number of shots fired, it's possible that Baynes also emptied his revolver at the man who shot and killed him with a semi-automatic. If so, Baynes missed.

In the video, notice how the people, except for the officer, barely react to gunshots. And just a minute later it's like things are back to normal. Traffic doesn't stop. People walk by like nothing happened. Not even a reason to interrupt your dog walk (9:44). People act like it's routine, because, unfortunately, it is. Sixteen of Baltimore 122 murders this year (to date) have been in the Eastern District. Many more get shot and live.
Such brave, good police work is also routine. An officer runs toward gunshots and single-handedly confronts a man whom he believes to be armed, a man who just killed a man. He does this by instinct and training. He does this not necessarily because he wants to, but because it is the right thing to do. Because running toward danger is his job. He did good, Officer Rogers did. Very good.

And then, after all this, all he wants to do is check his bodycam footage to see if the suspect is on it. If it were up to the ACLU and the police-are-the-problem set, police wouldn't be allowed to do so. That's crazy. Also, it takes 15 long minutes before somebody will watch the suspect so he can do so.

Good police work doesn't go viral like a video of bad policing or a cop doing something stupid. And if all people see are videos of cops shooting black men, they start believing that shooting black men is all cops do. So let's play the counterfactual game and imagine this went down differently. Let's say at 8:10 in the video the suspect made a move toward his waistband. Or maybe he didn't. Either way, let's say the officer shoots and kills the suspect. Would this be legally justifiable? Probably. Would it be correct? Well that depends if the suspect is armed. Can you tell if the suspect is? I cannot.

It turns out the suspect isn't armed, at least not at this moment when he's caught by police. So now you would have a scenario in which a bad cop has shot and killed an unarmed black man. In Baltimore, no less. Oh, that would go viral. Doesn't matter if the guy just killed somebody. The gun used to murder Mr. Baynes? Probably ditched in the alley and picked up by somebody else before it even bounced. Doesn't matter if the cop is African American (implicit bias and all). There would be protests and perhaps worse.

No matter what would happen now, the officer's life is ruined. Career over. Thrown under the bus by the department. He and his family will receive death threats. Perhaps they will have to go into hiding. A criminal prosecution would likely occur. Mosby has tried to convict cops for a lot less. All because this officer ran toward gunshots and misperceived a lethal threat. Harsh.

Should any single split-second decision really be the difference between a narrative of brave hero police officer and protests over an evil criminal cop who is now the only person from this incident on trial for murder? Perhaps we demand too much. We all make mistakes. What was the officer's intention? Well, to apprehend a shooter. It was not to kill the suspect, though he was prepared to do so.

Watch the video in real time, between 7:48 and 8:10. We're talking a total of 22 seconds. How would you react? Of course you might reasonably say, "I don't know. It's not my job to react. I'm not a cop." Ok. So let me ask this: how do you want police to react? Just as this cop did, right? Run towards gunshots, chase a suspect, and not shoot anybody, not even a bad guy. Job well done, right?

Nope. Not so fast.

See, the DOJ report on Baltimore Police, the one that opened the door to the consent decree, the one written by "progressive reformers" who have never let lack of police experience get in the way of telling police how to do their job, that report? Well it says Officer Rogers did it wrong. I mean, what if somebody got hurt?

If circumstances require that the suspect be immediately apprehended, officers should contain the suspect and establish a perimeter rather than engaging in a foot pursuit, particularly if officers believe the suspect may be armed.

You're kidding me, right? I don't even know what "containing" a suspect means, much less how you would go about setting up a "perimeter" to do so. This isn't idle talk. Last month in Seattle, because of a consent decree, an officer faced discipline for successfully subduing a man with a axe. If police get in trouble for making decisions and acting in the face of danger, there's really no point to having police at all. And that, of course, might be the "progressive" vision.

Luckily, back in the real world, we're left with the happy narrative of a brave officer who risked his life to apprehend a murder suspect. And luckily, in this case, no person-of-color was shot or killed at the hands of police. (Which seems to be just about the only thing reformers care about. The fact that two African-American men were shot, one fatally, doesn't seem to register much with the "woke" set.)
We have this happy narrative because, as is common, the officer did not shoot the suspect when he might have. We have a happy narrative because the suspect complied with the officer's orders. (The manner in which the suspect complied -- quickly and completely -- makes me seriously consider that the suspect isn't the actual shooter. But I don't know. He has been charged. Presumably gunshot residue on his hands answered this question.) But mostly we have a happy narrative because, despite all the haters, police in Baltimore and elsewhere are still out there, putting themselves in danger, trying to do the best they can in spite of it all.

As to the original call, the landlord-tenant dispute? It ain't going to close itself. At some point the dispatcher is going to need Officer Rogers to give it a code. I'm guessing it got a David-No, for "no police services needed."

Timeline:
0:34— Officer is on-scene at 1704 N Regester for a civil dispute.
7:48— 1st shot fired.
7:50— Officer starts running toward gunfire.
7:53— 15th shot is fired. shooting at 7:48-53 15 shots in 5 seconds
7:54— Officer gets on radio to report shots fired
8:00— Officer sees man in alley off to the left
8:08— Tell man to get drop the gun and get on the ground.
8:10— Suspect complies
8:18— Suspect is on ground in prone position
8:27— Officer: "My location..."
8:28— In all the excitement, the officer forgets his location. In his defense, he does appear to be out of sector (331 officer on 321 post). But still. Always know your 20. During the next 20 seconds, given he's out of breath and already said "shots fired," the dispatcher should be sending officers in the direction of 1700 N Regester, the location of his call. Little things like that matter. A good dispatcher can save an officer's life.
8:50— Officer gives his location.
9:26— Finally, the sweet savory sound of clicking handcuffs.
9:44— Man with dog walks by and says good job or something.
9:49— Backup arrives, one minute after location is announced.
10:35— Officer: "Check that alley.... This dude, I'm up there handling a landlord-tenant dispute. Then all the sudden people start shooting. Shooter's down right here. This dude I believe is the shooter. He just took his hoodie down. He might have dropped the gun in alley cause that's where he ran.
13:23— Radio: "One of the victims has a firearm in his waistband." We later learn (at 18:34) that this gun is a revolver. It's not clear if the revolver was fired at all. Either way, that leaves a semi-automatic belonging to the shooter who didn't get shot, and fired somewhere between 9 and 15 rounds.
13:30— Officer: "Why was you in the alley? And you just happened up here when the shooter came out, right?" Suspect: "Bro, I was walking up the alley to walk up North Avenue, bro, and I heard some shit. That's why I started running."
14:41— Officer tries to get somebody to watch the suspect so he can review his bodycam footage.
16:28— Shift commander: "What hundred block of Lafayette is Register at?" Uh, in the 1700 block, Baker-09. Where it's always been.
30:08— The suspect assures officer he wasn't doing nothing.
30:18— Finally, a kindly homicide detective agrees to watch the suspect the officer can return to his car to check his bodycam footage. "I'm not leaving till you do," she says.
30:20— Officer: "I swear. One simple thing. Ask one person to watch him so I can review the bodycam footage so we can close this. But nobody is listening to me. I'm only the one that chased the goddamn dude."

February 13, 2018

Yesterday the verdict came out. I wrote this op-ed for the Washington Post:

This current scandal is more than a case of a few bad apples, though bad apples they were. These officers acted with impunity until the FBI caught wind of their actions through an unrelated criminal investigation in Pennsylvania. A specialized police unit cannot survive for years as a criminal enterprise without the implicit — or overt — acquiescence of higher-ups. Effective leadership could have prevented this. Bad leadership has consequences.
...
Corrupt units tend to be specialized and selective. Once murky rumors begin about a unit or officer, good cops stay away for fear of trouble. The corrupt and brutal cops work together, as I once heard, as if pulled together by some magnetic force. You don’t just randomly get assigned to a plainclothes “gun trace task force.” This unit segregation removes officers from the otherwise corrective influence of the honest rank and file. There is no formal colleague review in policing; perhaps there should be.

Honest cops — still the vast majority — avoid trouble, as any citizen should hope. The rank and file cannot be blamed for keeping their noses clean, especially when unresolved questions remain about the integrity of internal affairs and the prosecutor’s office. These officers in Baltimore were guilty, but the systemic problems represent a failure of leadership, the same leadership that absolved itself of responsibility by inviting the Justice Department to investigate after Freddie Gray’s death.
...
Until 2015, policing and Baltimore had been getting better. After an excess of zero-tolerance policing in the early 2000s, Baltimore saw a sustained decline in both murder and arrests. From 2004 to 2011, murders declined from 278 to 197 while arrests dropped from 42 percent. People even began to move back to the city. After six decades of decline, the population increased. These civic and public safety gains reversed in 2015. Last year 343 people were murdered in Baltimore City, and the population and tax base is falling once again.

This year the police scandal is yet another black eye for a bruised city. Mayor Catherine Pugh, in a statement she later walked back, said she was too busy to follow the trial. The acting and presumed next police commissioner, Darryl De Sousa, is well-respected but will have his hands full. Corrupt police officers deserve special blame for committing crimes while in the public’s trust. But for a wounded Baltimore to rise again, city leaders, both elected and appointed, must accept their responsibility and get things done.

February 5, 2018

The first Quality Policing Podcast of the new year is up. Peter and Nick begin in (where else?) Baltimore, discussing the trial of detectives Daniel Hersl and Marcus Taylor, from the Baltimore Police Department’s Gun Trace Task Force. The two are accused of a range of criminal activities, including robbing drug dealers, and carrying pellet guns as "drop guns," and using Donald Stepp of Double D bail bonds as a fence for stolen drugs. Also, if you must break into and steal from Kenny Bird Johnson's car, please do not be a "rat punk."

Also on tap is a discussion of the Electronic Frontier Foundation's new guide to the evils of body worn video, which Nick described with not a small amount of revulsion - listen to Nick's QPP Extra on Body Cameras and surveillance here.
This week a cop was shot in the face in Louisville (he will survive), and Peter and Nick discuss that, and the response to it, and Peter raised the story from San Francisco of cops getting run over by car thieves, and the officers not shooting at the moving car that ran over the cop and one of the suspects, not once but twice.

Finally, a story from Christmas-time, the continuation of the monumentally stupid practice of cops stopping people to hand out money donated by local businessmen. This started, we think, a few years ago (here's a USA Today story from 2015) but it's continuing now; here's a story from Ohio about cops stopping cars to hand out cash... And here's the story from Kansas City, KS Nick was discussing.

Handing out charity used to be function of police. While this is unprecedented in recent history, it is not without precedent. In New York City, for instance, under Mayor Fiorello La Guardia, police handed out "relief." Who better to give to the needy than the neighborhood officers who knew the needy (and "worthy") residents of their beat. Peter forget to mention that in the podcast, so thanks for reading.

January 23, 2018

Justin Fenton of the Baltimore Sun has tweeted a crazy account of testimony in today's trial of corrupt Baltimore cops.

Crazy testimony in federal court just now by former Detective Maurice Ward, outlining illegal tactics used by Gun Trace Task Force Officers ...

They’d regularly drive fast at a larger group of people, slam brakes and pop their doors to see who ran, then detain and search them. They had no reason other than trying to provoke someone. 10-20 times on slow nights, as many as 50 times others, he said.

Ward said Sgt Jenkins profiled vehicles - “dope boy cars” such as Honda Accords, Acuras, Honda Odysseys - for car stops and would falsely claim he saw people not wearing seat belts or their windows were too darkly tinted.

Jenkins also had a thing about men over age of 18 carrying a book bag - probably drugs, he guessed, so they would stop them, Ward said.

More outrageous testimony from Det Ward: they kept BB guns on hand in case they hit someone or got into a shootout and needed to plant it on someone.

When they stopped someone suspected of being in the drug game, Jenkins would ask, “If you could put your own crew together and rob the biggest drug dealer you know of, who would it be?” And then they’d go after the person they named, to rob them.

Prosecutors dumped out a giant black bag, like a hockey equipment bag, onto the floor that apparently belonged to Jenkins that had masks, black clothes, shoes, and tools such as a rope with a grappling hook.

One of the craziest stories involved a man who they stole $100,000 from. Ward says Jenkins listened to the man's jail calls after he was arrested, and heard him talking about the officers stealing money from him. /1

The man said he was going to hire a good lawyer and try to go after them. Jenkins learned that the man's wife was handling things for him on the outside, and he wanted to extract her so he'd have to hire a public defender and plead out, Ward said /2

So on one of the calls, Jenkins heard the man talking to another woman. Jenkins, Ward said, had an officer with good handwriting write up a note purporting to be from the other woman saying she was pregnant, and dropped it in the wife's front door /3

This is just the first of four officers who will testify during this trial, and he hasn’t even been cross-examined yet.

This scandal is big. And it starts just as a new commissioner takes over the BPD. And that transition, from Davis to De Sousa, is just about the first good bit of policing news coming from Charm City in three years. Davis, you may remember, took over from Batts in 2015. Batts was the so called "progressive" who led the department into a riot and saw murder nearly double overnight in May, 2015. But rumor has it that Batts, to his credit, wouldn't go along with the futile (and failed) criminal prosecution of the six cops involved in the arrest and subsequent death in police custody of Freddie Gray. Davis, they say, got the job in part because he had so such qualms.

I don't know De Sousa, but I've only heard good things. At least now the possibility of change for the better.

I still can't get over the fact that the DOJ was investigating the Baltimore Police Department at the same time that all this was going on. What did they find? Poorly filled out "statements of probable cause," a few petty gray-area scandals from a decade ago, and, get this, black cops in Baltimore use the "n word." And yet they were totally clueless about all this happening under their nose. But we can't blame the investigators because, well, we don't know who they were since the report was anonymous and with the only the vaguest of "methods" section. But then the purpose of the DOJ report was not to find the truth, but rather show problem to legally trigger a consent decree.

The two highest-ranking Baltimore police officials in charge of instituting reforms, overhauling policies and ensuring compliance with the city’s consent decree with the U.S. Department of Justice have both resigned following Mayor Catherine Pugh’s firing of Police Commissioner Kevin Davis last week.

December 8, 2017

It's not much in the news because there's no racial angle to it. The officer was criminally charged today. I would say this might be third worst shooting of all time (Walter Scott and Andrew Thomas come to mine. Jonathan Ayers, too.) Speaking of Walter Scott. Former Officer Slager, who shot Scott, was sentenced today to 20 years in prison.

Peter Moskos is an associate professor in the Department of Law, Police Science, and Criminal Justice Administration at John Jay College of Criminal Justice. He is on the faculty of the City University of New York's Doctoral Programs in Sociology and a Senior Fellow of the Yale Urban Ethnography Project.

Moskos graduated from Princeton (AB) and Harvard (PhD) and was a Baltimore City Police Officer. He has authored three books: Cop in the Hood, In Defense of Flogging, and Greek Americans.

Me in 2000

Me in 2016

Critical Acclaim for Cop in the Hood

Cops like the book, Cop in the Hood:

"Should be made mandatory reading for every recruit in the Balto. City Police Academy. ... I am so proud that you were a Baltimore Police Officer and a good one." —Colonel (ret.) Margaret Patton, Baltimore City Police Department

"I just finished reading the last footnote! Great stuff." —NYPD Lt. Detective (ret.) David Durk

"I have been a cop now for 23 years and your book really captured what it's like to be a street cop. . . . Great book, great insights." —Detective-Commander Joseph Petrocelli

"Moskos strips away hard to decipher cop-speak and sociological mumbo jumbo and presents something easily digestible by the average reader.... Moskos is a veteran of a war [on drugs] he disagrees with. But he has walked the walk, respects the brotherhood and, as far as I’m concerned, still bleeds blue." —Pepper Spray Me

"Truly excellent.... Mandatory reading for all fans of The Wire and recommended for everyone else." —Tyler Cowen

"Ethnographic chutzpah.... Perhaps the best sociological account on what it means to police a modern ghetto.... Tells a great story centered around notions of race, power and social control." —Andrew Papachristos, American Journal of Sociology

"[An] objective, incisive and intelligent account of police work. Moskos's graphic descriptions of the drug culture... are the most detailed and analytical to be found anywhere. —Arnold Ages, Jewish Post & Opinion

It could have profound consequences.... In Defense of Flogging forces the reader to confront issues surrounding incarceration that most Americans would prefer not to think about. —Mansfield Frazier, The Daily Beast

“Flogging” is intriguing, even in — or because of — its shocking premise. As a case against prisons, Mr. Moskos' is airtight. —Washington Times

Compelling… Although his outrageous idea may conjure up unsavory reminders of U.S. slavery, by the end of “In Defense of Flogging,” Moskos might just have you convinced. —Salon

One of the very few public-policy books I've encountered that goes past wringing its hands over a societal problem.... Moskos's sharp little volume has a potential audience far beyond the experts. —Rich Fisher, Public Radio Tusla

A very important work... provocative, timely, and well-argued. I agree with you completely that our criminal justice system is out of control.... On one hand, the problems seem intractable. On the other hand, we're doomed if we don't do something about it. —(Former) CIA Agent John Kiriakou

It was, in truth, a book that I could not put down. I read it in two sittings (my butt was hurting after the first!)... You did well. —Gary Alan Fine, John Evans Professor of Sociology, Northwestern University.